


The History of the House of Lynch

by ElegantButler



Category: Original Work
Genre: Family, Knights - Freeform, Other, Vikings, pseudo-historical
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-27
Updated: 2014-10-30
Packaged: 2018-02-22 20:27:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2520734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElegantButler/pseuds/ElegantButler
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A family history, just a glimpse, of a family starting back in the days of the Vikings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The History of the Noble House of Lynch  
by Elegant Butler

 

Near the mountains that stood above the old town of Oasis Springs was a small plateau. Standing upon that was the manor house in which dwelt the Noble House of Lynch. 

The house was three stories tall at it’s highest set of rooms, a bedroom with ensuite. It was surrounded by a floral hedge with a pine archway leading from the well-manicured sidewalk to the front yard. 

There was no formal walkway from the sidewalk to the porch, just a yard filled with flowers which seemed to say “All guests must frolic before entering”. 

The house had been erected as a simple cottage when the town had first been incorporated in the year 1613, the same year in which a man thousands of miles away was publishing a book on the hierarchy of demons and the Globe Theater had burnt to the ground, taking several patrons and actors with it.

In the fall of 1612, Sir Kenneth Lynch, a young knight, had married Lady Sharon of the House of Morgan. It was they who had purchased the land the noble manor now stood upon, and they who had build the original cottage; a cozy room with a cookstove in one corner and a bed in the other with a little table in the middle just under the sole window. There was no bathroom back then. In those days each house, whether base or noble, had just a little chamberpot which was emptied into a little ditch after each use.

Outside there were two little gardens. One filled with flowers that cheered up the young wife on those occasions when her husband could not be home. The other was an herb garden in which she grew medicinal plants for the local midwife.

By the summer of 1614, Lady Sharon Lynch made it known to her husband that both her dresses and the house would need to be let out a bit. Sir Kenneth had been delighted and had got to work at once on adding a new room to the cottage. The Lady would have to have her dresses let out by someone else.


	2. The Family of Kenneth and Sharon

House of Lynch Part 2  
Kenneth and Sharon - Continued

 

Sir Kenneth and Lady Sharon became the parents of a baby boy in mid June and twin girls three autumns later. The boy was named Angus after Sharon’s grandfather, the girls Magna and Ashley after Kenneth’s mother and aunt respectively.

As the children grew older, they improved in both grace and stature.

By the time he was fourteen, Angus was acting as his father’s squire. It was common in those days for the sons of knights to follow in the ways of their father, and important to Kenneth that his should do the same. 

Lady Sharon did not approve of her son traveling too far during her husband’s errands, but as the opinions of women mattered very little in those days, she did not have much say in the matter. So she bit her lip save for those very few times when both had come home with wounds from some skirmish or duel. Then, she would tear into her husband with the fury of a wife and mother who has almost lost her two favorite boys.

Sir Kenneth and Angus would be almost to the point of contrition when the girls would join their mother, trying to look cross and wagging their fingers. However, at the age of eleven, and with flowers braided into their hair, this came off more as comical than cross and both father and son always ended up laughing heartily, despite their wounds. After a while, mother and daughters would join in, all just happy that neither father nor son was fatally wounded.

When the girls were of courting age, Lady Sharon brought them with her to a number of social gatherings which were held at the homes of the town’s three finest noblewomen; Lady Sarah of House MacMillan, Lady Dores of the Noble and Most Equitable House of Holmes, and Lady Bethany of the House of Stephens. All three had fine sons of courting age and it was the hope of Lady Sharon of the Noble House of Lynch that her daughters might be noticed but one such as they. 

So it was to her horror that she had discovered that Ashley had eloped with Vincent Ainsley, son of John Ainsley who was butler to the House of Stephens. 

The following year saw Magna married to Lord Albert Holmes. Ashley and her husband were not invited. This, as you may have guessed, caused a bit of a row between her Ashley and her mother when she spotted her sister in the marketplace several months later, both great with child and realized what must have happened.

 

As for Angus, he met with a woman warrior named Brynhilde Eriksdotter during a campaign that took him and his father across the ocean. The two began a most curious relationship, courting during quiet times, and fighting side-by-side in times of battle. It was shortly after one such battle that Angus received his knighthood. And shortly after this, Sir Angus asked for Brynhilde’s hand. 

The warrior-maiden gladly accepted the proposal and the two married in the winter on the coast of the North Sea. In the following winter, their son Aldrik was born.


	3. Aldrik and Verdandi

House of Lynch Part 03

 

Aldrik Lynch was called Aldrik Anguson by his maternal aunt Dyrhildr Aerunasdotter after the old family naming tradition. His sister, to whom aunt Dyrhildr was midwife, was named Verdandi Byrnhildesdotter. 

Aldrik prefered the quill to the sword. During the nights that followed the daily skirmishes of the long campaign that had waged since the early days of his sister’s life, he put tip to parchment writing down long lays on the subject of how well or poorly the battle seemed to have done that day, and short dirges in honor of those who had fallen.

That wasn’t to say that he did not see combat. The war in those days was so widespread that it was mandatory for all young men of fighting age to join the ranks. 

Verdandi also joined up. Neither she nor her brother would ever forget the day she had taken up her mother’s sword.

Verdandi had been engaged to marry a farmer named Alistair Cottington, a goodly man whose great grandfather had come from across the sea when farmland in his home village had grown scarce after a tyrant had confiscated the lands and poisoned the crops.

The two had met at the town market during Verdandi’s sixteenth autumn and he had offered to take her on as a milkmaid. 

The girl who bore a Valkyrie’s name was of a mind to tell him that she was a warrior maiden and did not take kindly to the offer of milking cows, Alistair had one of those smiles that you just can’t say “no” to and she soon found herself gathering up the old bucket each morning while he worked out in the fields with the crops.

It was this same smile he wore on the day he asked her to become his wife. 

On the morning of her wedding day, she put on her dress, walked outside with her mother and father, and saw the flames that cover the house and fields of Cottington Farm. Stricken, she ran to the farm, seeing the tracks that led to and from its gates. 

She could tell that this was no accident or divine act. So turning and walking quietly back to the house, she cast her veil and the ring he’d given her into the flames. She didn’t bother to change out of her gown as she girded herself with sword and dagger and mounted her silver grey steed Gunnar.

On the field of battle, she became known as the Bride of Doom, fearing neither death nor storm. Some called her Verdandi Tyrsdotter. Those last were those who followed her into combat on the morning after the leader of their group had been mortally wounded and had gone beyond this world in the night. 

The battle had not been without its losses. Twenty men and two women were lost that day. Those who survived mourned their loss with mead and fire and listened to the dirges of Aldrik as he sang in respectful tones while the pyre-boats floated solemnly out to the great sea.


	4. Aldrik and Banon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aldrik seeks to court his beloved

History of the House of Lynch 04

 

Aldrik’s gentle voice attracted the affections of the warrior maiden Banon Bleddyn.

Banon had come from across the North Sea with her small tribe and a couple of others at the request of the Viking armies who sought good allies against the foes who had swelled their ranks with allies of their own.

A fighter before all else, she had nonetheless found that her heart swelled with strong emotion at the sound of young Aldrik’s songs.

Aldrik was glad of these affections, and approached her brother Bran to ask if he might court her properly. 

Bran explained that he could not give this permission, that it must be asked of their father who was back in Caerwys. And so Aldrik bid goodbye to his sister and the woman he loved and set off overseas to seek out Bryce Bleddyn.

 

The people of Caerwys were a kindly if distrustful people; good to their own but wary of strangers. So it took him many hours to find an inn where he might stay for the night. When he awoke the next morning, he paid the innkeeper for his room and breakfast.

Asking where he might find Bryce Bleddyn he received no answer from the people at the White Crow Inn. And so he gathered up his things and set into town to find the man he wished to speak to.

It was from a woman selling scarves in a stall at the town market that he learned that Bryce was the town’s swordsmith. Bleddyn’s smithy, she explained, was just outside of town to the east.

 

Bryce Bleddyn was in his mid fifties, but as strong and well-built as any fighting man of twenty. The years he had spent in his forge had been good to him. 

When Aldrik told him of his reason for coming, Bryce gave him a stern look. Aldrik knew he was not going to get a simple “yes” for an answer, and this proved to be the case.

He was to stay in the Bleddyn house for three days and work in the smithy. If he proved himself worthy by that time, he would be given permission to court Banon. If not he would be sent home empty handed with orders to keep away from her.

Aldrik decided that he would not return home if that were the case. He could not bear to be near her if he could not have her for his own.

As it turned out, he had nothing to fear. Aldrik was almost as good a swordsmith’s apprentice as he was a warrior. He made a few mistakes at first, but Bryce was as good a teacher as he was a master and by the last day he had learned much of the trade. 

So, on the morning of the fourth day, he set off back to his home a new sword forged especially for him by Bryce, and a glad heart. 

He paid court to Banon for a year and a day. They were married in Caerwys by the Dominie of the town kirk, taking the last name of Lynch in honor of Aldrik’s father and remaining with Bryce Bleddyn until the week’s end before journeying to Cardiff for their honeymoon. 

Aldrik and Banon Lynch both fell in love with the village and bought a small house there. A year later, their first son was born. Banon named him Alawn after her great uncle on her mother’s side. Their second son, Bryce, came four years later along with a twin sister who was named Armes.


	5. Alawn's Last Day in Cardiff

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The children set off from Cardiff to Caerwys

History of the House of Lynch 05

 

Alrik Lynch died shortly after his eldest son turned seventeen. Banon did not remarry, though she had several good offers. To ease her burden, her father offered to take in her eldest son Alawn as an apprentice. He was, he told her, getting on in years and needed someone to take over the smithy when his time came. 

Banon agreed to this, asking also if he might take Bryce and Armes as well. The winter, she reasoned, would be bitter cold this year. More so than usual if the predictions held true. And they might find warmth in the smithy during the day.

At first Bryce Bleddyn disagreed. A smithy was no place for children. After all, there was hot metal, and sharp swords. His next letter suggested that she might come also. But she sent a polite refusal, explaining that if no one remained in the house in Cardiff it might be mistaken as abandoned and sold out from under them.

In the end, Bryce agreed to take in all three children. 

At first Alawn was firmly against it, accusing his mother of trying to get rid of them. In time, however, he realized that this was not so. Winter would be harsh this year if the predictions held true and they would have a better chance at survival at the smithy, even if Caerwys was slightly colder than Cardiff.

With a sad heart, Banon bid goodbye to her children. Along with some clothing, she packed food for a week’s journey. She also gave them a purse of coins, telling them that these were to be used to find shelter in the night. 

Alawn helped his younger brother and sister onto their shared horse before he mounted his own. Then, with a final wave goodbye, they rode away from their Cardiff home.


End file.
